Path: utzoo!utgpu!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!rpi!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!samsung!nstar!tbissett From: tbissett@nstar.rn.com (Travis Bissett) Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga.hardware Subject: Re: Amiga Custom Chips - why hasn't C= made them faster? Message-ID: Date: 7 Apr 91 03:42:26 GMT References: <1991Apr5.034303.14202@engin.umich.edu> Sender: bbs@nstar.rn.com (BBS Account) Organization: Indiana's Public Access Unix Site 219-289-0287 Lines: 37 milamber@caen.engin.umich.edu (Daryl Scott Cantrell) writes: > > 3) There are a lot better things software people at CBM should worry about. > Virtual memory comes to mind as a far more productive use for the MMU. Can > you say 100 MB free? [insert drool noise] Not to mention color X-Windows > for Unix, etc., etc... All of which (ok, some of which anyway..) I'm sure > they're thinking-about/designing/coding/lying-to-us-about-not-having-yet at > this very moment. > In my humble opinion VM is much overrated and strikes me as mostly fad. Maybe it was important when oxide was a lot cheaper than silicon. But ram is cheap. I've heard that Crays don't bother with virtual memory -- they just add the gigabytes they need. How many people can actually afford to allocate 100 MB of hard disk for VM swap space? And who would possibly want to run a mix of users/applications that might NEED 100 MB of swap? Lawd awmighty it would be a slllooowwwwwww way to work. It just strikes me as humorous in a Douglas Adams sort of way that the computer industry believes the hype about VM and MMU, but the first thing they read in the manual for improving system performance is to add more ram so as to reduce the need for memory swapping! Pleae don't misunderstand me. For a multiuser computer (can we still say "minicomputer"?) virtual memory and memory protection are absolutely necessary. But for a single user platform -- even tho' mul;titasking -- VM and MMU is moslty marketing hype and not a true technical requirement (IMHO). I use a unix 386 (16MHz) at work and I'm glad to come home to a "lowly" PC with a keyboard garage that at least doesn;t feel like a waltzing elephant! Travis -- Travis Bissett NSTAR conferencing site 219-289-0287 internet: tbissett@nstar.rn.com 1300 newsgroups - 8 inbound lines uucp: ..!uunet!nstar.rn.com!tbissett 99 file areas - 4300 megabytes --- backbone news & mail feeds available - contact larry@nstar.rn.com ---